Coming To America

We are a nation of immigrants and my family is no exception. My family originated in the small village of Cloz in the Val di Non of Northern Italy (then Austria). It is a tightly knit place of ancient people and ancient ways. During the 1860’s, the economy became so bad that many families were literally starving to death. Like other Europeans, they looked to America for comfort and salvation.

My family was certainly not the first to pick-up and go to America. Many others had gone before. Instead, my great-grandfather tried to earn a living in Germany as an eisemponieri (railroad laborer) constructing tunnels in Bavaria. When he returned to his native Cloz, he died of appendicitis at age 40. His son, my grandfather Eugenio, decided he did not want to share the same fate and boarded a ship for America in 1891.